Crossword and Sudoku brain-teasers.

ACROSS

1 Artist from Provence whose paintings include The Basket of Apples, The Bathers, The Peppermint Bottle and Still Life with a Ginger Jar and Eggplants (7)

5 Bearing panicles of fragrant blueish-lilac flowers in May, a vine found climbing over old English country houses, walled gardens and areas around London (8)

9 Herb with aromatic feathery fronds with a similar taste to fennel, used to flavour fish dishes, gravlax and tzatziki (4)

13 Victorian polymath whose designs of mechanical computers with those of pioneering programmer Ada Lovelace influenced the steampunk genre (7)

14 Living in a holt and with young called cubs, a semi-aquatic fish-eating mammal related to the weasel, mink, stoat, badger and ferret (5)

15 Author of a series of seven autobiographies including I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, The Heart of a Woman and Mom & Me & Mom (7)

16 Variety of chalcedony formed from layers of quartz, used to make cabochons, beads, pestleand-mortar sets and toy marbles (5)

17 Tuft-like ornament with a variety of uses such as a key fob, curtain tie or to decorate a loafer, mortarboard or keffiyeh headdress (6)

18 Types of words in a thesaurus (8)

20 Deliciously ____; containing a collection of plant-based recipes, the fastest-selling debut cookbook ever (4)

22 Legendary courtier to Dionysius II who was seated under a naked sword suspended by a hair to teach him the precarious nature of happiness (8)

24 Following his official renouncement of the name Saxe-Coburg and Gotha in 1917, the first monarch of the House of Windsor (6,1)

27 Instrument with a gnomon for telling the time; one of the devices made by horologist Thomas Tompion (7)

28 Czech novelist who wrote The Book of Laughter and Forgetting and The Unbearable Lightness of Being (7) 29 Word heard by some listeners in a recent internet audio-illusion consisting of a sound bite of the word “laurel”(5)

31 Diamanté-like spangle (10)

33 The capital of Ethiopia (5,5)

36 Desert Island Discs host who fronted the BBC’s coverage of the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex (5)

38 One of the four main precious gems; a form of beryl traditionally used as a birthstone for May (7)

40 Synonymous with Saville Row, sewing professionals specialising in made-to-measure shirts and suits (7)

41 Occupation involving investigating atoms, molecules and elements (7)

42 Beetle considered a gardener’s ally; an imprint of illustrated books for children; or, as two words, a recent movie based on a motherdaughter relationship (8)

43 Recipient of a Nobel Prize for research in radio astrophysics whose uncle Gilbert wrote

The Concept of Mind (4)

46 Leading cellist who premièred John Tavener’s The Protecting Veil in 1989 (8)

49 Author of the Helliconia trilogy whose story Supertoys Last All Summer Long formed the basis of Steven Spielberg’s A.I. Artificial Intelligence (6)

51 Italian for a comic opera singer (5)

54 Through the _______; panel show originally with David Frost and Lloyd Grossman (7)

55 Segment of a bulb of garlic; or, an aromatic flower bud of an Indonesian tree used in sweet and savoury recipes (5)

56 Country with cities including Rabat, Fez, Marrakesh, Casablanca and Tangier (7)

57 Organism studied in dendrology (4)

58 __ ____ __ It Gets; film with Jack Nicholson as a misanthropic author (2,4,2)

59 A set or series of 100, especially consecutive years, runs at cricket or miles on a single bike ride (7)

DOWN

1 _______ rose; old fashioned pink peony-like bloom, Rosa centifolia (7)

2 Kept by Walter Rothschild, an animal known collectively as a zeal (5)

3 The capital of Niger (6)

4 Former world no. 1 tennis player known on the court as the Ice Maiden (5)

5 Georgian town in the Oxfordshire Cotswolds, site of Blenheim Palace (9)

6 Operatic soprano noted for her coloratura role as Lucia in Gaetano Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor (10)

7 Jane ____; Charlotte Brontë novel (4)

8 Country with a green, white and red national flag known as il Tricolore (5)

10 With eight whisky distilleries, the “Queen of the Hebrides” near Jura (5)

11 Known as le Bien-Aimé (the Beloved), the king of France from 1715-74 (5,2)

12 Rural science concerned with crop production and soil management (8)

19 Coastal city in West Flanders, formerly linked to Dover via ferry (6)

21 Angular distance east or west of the prime meridian expressed in degrees (9)

23 Traditionally measured in rods, perches or poles, a plot of land rented for use as a potager or for hen- or bee-keeping (9)

24 Ridley Scott film with Russell Crowe (9)

25 Practiced by John Burke, the study and tracing of lineage (9)

26 Bird of prey, a toy or a small sail (4)

27 A cloud of droplets; a sprig forming a handtied bunch of flowers; or, a brooch in the form of a jewelled bouquet (5)

30 Irish poet who co-founded the Abbey Theatre with Lady Gregory in 1904 (5)

32 Knitting implement; or, a pine leaf (6)

34 Egyptian god in the form of a bull; or, the genus of the honeybee (4)

35 Tree with fragrant bark and timber used for essential oil and incense (10) 37 Documentary-film pioneer and GPO Film Unit chief whose productions include Drifters and Night Mail (8)

39 James Joyce short story collection (9)

41 Game traditionally played in whites (7)

44 Financial state of a country or region, especially in terms of GDP (7)

45 Moon named after a fairy king (6)

47 Section of a flower’s pistil (5)

48 Thoughts discussed in a brainstorming session or by a think tank (5)

50 Lemony spice derived from dried berries, served sprinkled over chickpea salads, hummus or grilled meat (5)

52 Triangular scarf or shawl (5)

53 Brand of smart speaker designed by Amazon to connect to Alexa (4) A sudoku grid has a 9x9 grid that is further subdivided into nine 3x3 boxes. To solve the puzzle, each of the rows, columns and 3x3 boxes should contain all the digits from 1 to 9. The solution to this puzzle will be published in next week’s issue.